This invention relates to agricultural products. More specifically, this invention relates to a bale accumulator system.
Currently, in the agricultural arts balers are used to traverse through fields in order to pick up stover, stalks, plant remains and the like in order to form bales. A tractor pulls a baler along that intakes the stover or stalks and presses them into a bale and a slide at the back of the baler deposits the bale within the field once the bale gets to a predetermined size. This system is problematic because it randomly places large and heavy bales of hay periodically throughout a field. These bales must then be moved or hauled to different locations typically causing many man hours to be used in order to remove the bales from the field. In addition, there is no control where a specific bale will end up being placed in the field and bales can be placed in mud or in other unsatisfactory locations making moving the bales even more difficult and potentially causing bales to become wet.
In order to address this issue bale accumulators have been manufactured that trail behind the baler and present a platform on which bales can rest. Then, after a predetermined amount of bales are on the accumulator, the accumulator can be taken to a predetermined location in the field to unload the bales. The problem with accumulators is that once a single row of baled hay is accumulated either the bales must be dumped at that location, which again, can be undesirable or baling must be stopped so that the bales can be unloaded at a predetermined location such as at the edge of a field. Again, while an improvement, problems still remain. Current designs are limited to low bale numbers due to design limits reducing the benefit of accumulation by having many more groups of bales placed about a field.
As a result, some accumulators attempt to present embodiments they increase the size of the platform and provide mechanisms in order to place the bales at additional locations on a wider and bigger platform. These mechanisms typically are very difficult to use, involve many moving parts, are difficult to maintain and don't always function as desired. Thus, a need in the art exists for a more efficient and longer lasting bale accumulator that holds a large number of bales that overcomes the problems in the art.
Thus, a principal object of the present invention is to provide a bale accumulator that efficiently moves bales of hay to additional storage sections on the accumulator.
Yet another object of the present invention is to provide a bale accumulator that is easy to maintain and operate.
These and other objectives, features, and advantages will become apparent from the rest of the specification and claims.